I am convinced that Toronto will have a major global competitive advantage in the next century – access to Lake Ontario:
India, the world’s second-most populous nation, is doubling spending on water management to a record as conglomerates from the Tatas to Adani face shortages that the United Nations calls an impending crisis.
…
Disputes with farmers demanding rights to their irrigated land have stalled about $80 billion of investment by companies including Posco and ArcelorMittal (MT) as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeks to revive an economy growing at the slowest pace in a decade. Tata Steel Ltd. (TATA), India’s biggest maker of the alloy, is setting annual targets to cut water usage as two-thirds of the country faces a scarcity, H.M. Nerurkar, managing director said in an April 11 interview.“Water availability is a very big issue and in the coming days this will be a far bigger issue,” A.P. Choudhary, chairman of Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd., India’s second-biggest state-run steelmaker, said in an interview. “Water is critical for the steel industry’s growth and no company is comfortably placed.”
Toronto area real-estate is already pretty expensive, but if I were a speculating kind of guy, I’d be thinking seriously about buying land in places like Cleveland and Detroit, and just trying to get enough current revenue to break even for the next thirty years.
It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good:
Donald R. Mullen Jr., who helped Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) profit from the U.S. housing crash, is giving the firm and its clients a way to gain from the recovery.
Mullen, 54, has raised almost $1 billion to buy single- family houses to rent since leaving Goldman Sachs last year as head of global credit and mortgages, five years after overseeing the bank’s bet against the imploding subprime home-loan market. His Fundamental REO LLC has already purchased or is close to acquiring almost 2,500 properties through foreclosure auctions, government agencies and even an Arizona non-profit that promotes affordable-home ownership, property records show.
Spend-Every-Penny is explaining why he has to extend his control over, and micromanagement of, the country’s financial system:
he federal budget, released in March, plans to prohibit lenders from selling insured mortgages to investors through any securitization method that is not managed by federally-run Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp . (CMHC).
That bombshell came “without any warning and without any consultation,” said Stephen Smith, president of the largest non-bank lender, First National. Speaking at the National Bank Canadian Financial Services Conference, Mr. Smith said the “collateral damage” to ABCP and smaller lenders “was not fully considered” by government officials.
…
In a statement, a Department of Finance official explained the government’s reasoning as follows:“The Government is making these changes to increase market discipline in residential lending and reduce taxpayer exposure to the housing sector. Funding channels that use taxpayer-backed insured mortgages should be subject to minimum standards and Canadian oversight in order to promote financial stability.”
…
What the new rules really do is force lenders to sell their mortgages in the specific method dictated by Ottawa, as opposed to potentially lower cost private securitization.
The Central Planners have learnt the lessons of the Credit Crunch well – you can justify any idiocy you like, as long as you chant the magic words: “Hocus Pocus, Financial Stability, Abracadabra!”
Stop the presses! Gensler of the CFTC said something sensible!
Two interest rate benchmarks that banks were fined for rigging should be scrapped and replaced by indicators based on market transactions, a top U.S. regulator said on Monday.
The changes should also include benchmarks linked to gold, oil and other commodities, said Gary Gensler, chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
Regrettably, he did not explain how such a ban would be enforced. But doubtless there are lots of levers to use – call it terrorism, for instance. That’s what the Brits do.
We now know why the feds introduced covered bond legislation: it was to give a regulatory advantage to their future employers:
DBRS notes that there appear to be two unintended consequences of the legislation and the Guide, based on discussions with several Canadian issuers over the past few months.
First, as the requirements for continuous disclosure and data compliance required by the Guide are broad, extensive and, at times, onerous, the amount of time and effort required to comply with the mandated standard is substantial, which is also expected to be costly. Therefore, DBRS is of the opinion that lenders other than domestic systemically important banks (DSIBs) are not likely to pursue registration as a covered bond issuer under the legislation, and would therefore be at a disadvantage without the benefit of covered bond funding.
Second, as the legislation explicitly prohibits the issuance of covered bonds without registration, DBRS does not expect to see any coexistence of registered covered bonds and non-registered covered bonds in Canada, except for existing grandfathered covered bond programs.
It was a good day for the Canadian preferred share market, with PerpetualPremiums gaining 3bp, FixedResets winning 32bp and DeemedRetractibles gaining 14bp. Volatility was very good, dominated by winning FixedResets. Volume was quite high.
| HIMIPref™ Preferred Indices These values reflect the December 2008 revision of the HIMIPref™ Indices Values are provisional and are finalized monthly |
|||||||
| Index | Mean Current Yield (at bid) |
Median YTW |
Median Average Trading Value |
Median Mod Dur (YTW) |
Issues | Day’s Perf. | Index Value |
| Ratchet | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.2306 % | 2,592.4 |
| FixedFloater | 3.97 % | 3.20 % | 32,755 | 18.74 | 1 | -1.4839 % | 4,133.4 |
| Floater | 2.68 % | 2.88 % | 83,600 | 20.05 | 4 | 0.2306 % | 2,799.1 |
| OpRet | 4.81 % | 2.18 % | 63,087 | 0.19 | 5 | 0.0000 % | 2,606.8 |
| SplitShare | 4.80 % | 4.03 % | 127,316 | 4.12 | 5 | -0.0078 % | 2,962.5 |
| Interest-Bearing | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.0000 % | 2,383.7 |
| Perpetual-Premium | 5.19 % | 3.07 % | 84,755 | 0.85 | 32 | 0.0279 % | 2,377.8 |
| Perpetual-Discount | 4.84 % | 4.84 % | 169,807 | 15.72 | 4 | 0.0000 % | 2,690.0 |
| FixedReset | 4.93 % | 2.81 % | 251,665 | 3.78 | 80 | 0.3176 % | 2,503.0 |
| Deemed-Retractible | 4.87 % | 3.52 % | 129,030 | 1.38 | 44 | 0.1449 % | 2,451.2 |
| Performance Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Change | Notes |
| BAM.PR.G | FixedFloater | -1.48 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2043-04-22 Maturity Price : 22.92 Evaluated at bid price : 23.90 Bid-YTW : 3.20 % |
| SLF.PR.I | FixedReset | 1.08 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2016-12-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.13 Bid-YTW : 3.04 % |
| FTS.PR.H | FixedReset | 1.19 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2043-04-22 Maturity Price : 23.76 Evaluated at bid price : 25.59 Bid-YTW : 2.53 % |
| MFC.PR.J | FixedReset | 1.20 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2018-03-19 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.17 Bid-YTW : 3.06 % |
| MFC.PR.H | FixedReset | 1.22 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2017-03-19 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.58 Bid-YTW : 3.00 % |
| GWO.PR.N | FixedReset | 1.26 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2025-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 24.10 Bid-YTW : 3.15 % |
| GWO.PR.H | Deemed-Retractible | 1.28 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-09-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.24 Bid-YTW : 4.40 % |
| IAG.PR.G | FixedReset | 1.50 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2017-06-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.36 Bid-YTW : 2.99 % |
| MFC.PR.G | FixedReset | 6.38 % | YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2016-12-19 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.33 Bid-YTW : 2.98 % |
| Volume Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Shares Traded |
Notes |
| PWF.PR.S | Perpetual-Premium | 175,668 | Scotia crossed 40,000 at 25.55. RBC crossed blocks of 50,000 and 49,900 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2022-04-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.55 Bid-YTW : 4.51 % |
| SLF.PR.I | FixedReset | 105,550 | Nesbitt crossed 100,000 at 26.05. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2016-12-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.13 Bid-YTW : 3.04 % |
| TRP.PR.D | FixedReset | 76,990 | TD bought 20,700 from RBC at 26.05. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2043-04-22 Maturity Price : 23.40 Evaluated at bid price : 26.02 Bid-YTW : 3.34 % |
| CU.PR.F | Perpetual-Premium | 74,380 | TD crossed blocks of 35,000 and 25,000, both at 25.51. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2022-06-01 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.55 Bid-YTW : 4.29 % |
| BAM.PF.A | FixedReset | 68,689 | National crossed 20,000 at 26.75. Scotia crossed 25,000 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2018-09-30 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.58 Bid-YTW : 3.29 % |
| TD.PR.S | FixedReset | 57,907 | RBC crossed 35,200 at 24.86. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Hard Maturity Maturity Date : 2022-01-31 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 24.80 Bid-YTW : 2.90 % |
| There were 49 other index-included issues trading in excess of 10,000 shares. | |||
| Wide Spread Highlights | ||
| Issue | Index | Quote Data and Yield Notes |
| RY.PR.I | FixedReset | Quote: 25.46 – 25.86 Spot Rate : 0.4000 Average : 0.2571 YTW SCENARIO |
| IAG.PR.C | FixedReset | Quote: 25.68 – 25.99 Spot Rate : 0.3100 Average : 0.2032 YTW SCENARIO |
| BAM.PR.G | FixedFloater | Quote: 23.90 – 24.40 Spot Rate : 0.5000 Average : 0.4043 YTW SCENARIO |
| MFC.PR.B | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 24.75 – 25.08 Spot Rate : 0.3300 Average : 0.2492 YTW SCENARIO |
| IAG.PR.G | FixedReset | Quote: 26.36 – 26.64 Spot Rate : 0.2800 Average : 0.1999 YTW SCENARIO |
| FTS.PR.G | FixedReset | Quote: 25.06 – 25.28 Spot Rate : 0.2200 Average : 0.1443 YTW SCENARIO |